HOME DECORATION : Creative Designs Can Turn Your Ceiling Into Something to Look Up To

The curtains are poufed, tied, and hung, the furniture is finessed into place, and yet your room seems to be missing that extra decorative spark. Rather than be downcast, Window & Wall Ideas magazine says try looking up. Ceilings offer an untapped canvas for your creativity.

The “fifth wall” in a house is often simply masked in white paint to make it disappear. Although this technique enhances the sense of space, it does nothing for appeal.

“Ceilings are really ignored because they aren’t a focal point,” says Chicago interior designer Shirley Fischer. “You just don’t automatically look up. It’s after a while that you notice a decorated ceiling, and it works best if it’s unexpected.”

Here are some decorating tips:

* Appealing paint. A ceiling simply painted a soft, light color--rather than white--will still seem to float away, but will also hold an extra gallon or two of pizazz. The opposite effect can be achieved in a too-large room. A darker color will appear to pull the ceiling closer.

Beyond these basics, you can create more smiles per gallon with imaginative painting techniques. Use soft pastels for a summery multicolor look. Try painting wide bands of color that spill into stripes on the walls, or thread dark pin-stripes through a mellow background for added attractiveness.

Fischer created a circus scene on the ceiling of a baby’s room, and she painted a library ceiling to look like worn leather.

Other creative painting techniques imitate marble or crackle like an antique. Sponge-painting with two or three soft colors can make the ceiling seem powdery soft. Rolling a rag or dragging a comb through paint, exposing an underlayer of another color, can create subtle but powerful patterns.

* Stunning stencils. Whether you prefer a twining ivy or a basic geometric pattern, an easy-to-use stencil can create an accent where you need it most. Fischer has used paint, stencils, and even snippets of wallpaper to accentuate the base of light fixtures that lack luster.

Stencils can curl in the corner, cover a soffit, highlight the ceiling’s center, or climb from the wall onto the ceiling. Often, just a stencil in a corner of the ceiling can have whole-room impact.

* Fantastic fabrics. Just as a threadbare sofa draws new energy from a slipcover, a weary ceiling can use a face lift, too. You can continue a wallpaper onto the ceiling, or leave the walls bare and put the paper overhead. Light, small-print designs will keep the paper from becoming oppressively heavy.

“You can use some fun wallpaper, like with stars, to accent the ceiling and draw attention up,” says Baltimore interior designer Stephen O’Brien. He says that a ceiling treatment can invigorate even a small room without overpowering it.

Another option is a swath of fabric, such as a sheet, that swoops into a dramatic canopy. It can work over a bed, or simply hang it as decoration in a mundane room. In rooms with a too-high ceiling, you can visually drop the ceiling by installing a molding about 1 foot from the top of the wall, then cover the ceiling and the wall above the molding with fabric or wallpaper.

* Catchy creativity. Still haven’t found the look you want? A more ambitious decorating project may help.

A ceiling ribbed with beams creates a special rustic mood and provides a place to nest accessories, such as baskets and dried flowers. Beams can also fit a contemporary scheme if they are light-colored and smooth.

Although lugging thick, rugged beams into place may seem to be a heavy task, most decorative beams are lightweight.

Pressed metal, which is usually steel stamped with a decorative motif, provides a reflective 19th-Century look. Whether it’s painted or left in its natural gleaming condition, the pressed metal brightens a room.

Skylights, mirrors, and paintings mounted to the ceiling are some other ways to inject zest. You may wish to “frame” your work of art with a crown molding, or a molding painted in an accent color.

A wallpaper border or stencil can also patrol the perimeter with flair. The basic rule, Fischer says, is to avoid decorating a ceiling if the room is already busy, and when you do decorate above, look for an unexpected place.

“If you see a decorated ceiling in room after room, it becomes monotonous and boring,” she says. “If it’s unexpected, it’s exciting.”